The Intranet Value

Generally, the attention of the UI designer goes to public sites/applications.
But there are a lot of web based applications that are running inside the firewall. Like intranet sites.

Maybe for small business is it too much to have an intranet, but it becomes important when there many employees and different locations.

An intranet shall be the image of the company and and a reference for the employees. This is by the book.
But in real life Intranet and employees a lot of times are not in the same universe.
Usually it is the repository for all the documents and the applications used for working. But without a strong mapping of the knowledge, it becomes quickly the black-hole of the documents.
Not only.
In fact an intranet is seen as an enforcement from the central company’s office.

To be effective, an intranet shall be a meeting point for the employees, where they could find information, news and usable stuff for their daily work.
My uncle, now retired, told me that he felt his company like a family, not like an external “object” which he had an interaction with.
I never forgot this words. I’m used to change job and working environment frequently: I worked a lot of time as freelance and as an employee too, but in any case, this feeling of belonging is something of the past. But not something impossible!
It depends a lot on the approach of the company. And what could be the main vehicle for it? A intranet.

I cannot decide it, but sometimes I can explain the importance of the communication choices to be used on the intranet.
My golden rules are:

• strong information architecture: everyone shall find the documents that he needs
• clear and usable news and information quickly available
• focus on employees interests and needs
• clear brand communication

And this one is NOT the last thing… but the FIRST!
The brand image is what the corporate communicates to the world, but to the employees too. An intranet shall have a clear and consistent branding image: all the information and areas that are inside of the intranet shall be part of it, not many single things each one with their own look&feel.

I’ve tried to put in this post all that I learned from my experience, but there are a lot of things that we can do to make the daily work of our user better.